Count but not lost, which is my greatest gain
"To the left," Malik instructed, squinting at the piece of paper in his hands, "wait no… the right,"
"For the love of God! Give me that!" Bakura snatched the piece of paper out of tanned hands and glared at it in vein before letting out a frustrated groan, "this isn't right, Malik, we shouldn't be mixing the two rituals together,"
"Ishizu's meditation idea is too meek," Malik repeated his reasoning for the hundredth time, "she thinks we're merely warding off some lingering memories—"
"And that's not what we're doing?" Bakura chimed in.
"No. It's stronger than just memories," Malik snapped, "he's back and I want him gone, so we're being as thorough as possible,"
"Yes, and mixing ancient Egyptian magic with one of Ryou's occult voodoo books is very thorough,"
"Oh shut it," Malik grabbed one of the wax candles and hurled it at Bakura's head, "you use this shit all the time, mixing it with the power of the ring, don't tell me you don't approve,"
"I use the millennium ring to fuel them, I do not, never have, and would think it foolish, to depend on voodoo alone, even my Landlord would tell you that," Bakura explained indignantly before having the paper snapped back from his grasp.
"The left, I was right the first time," Malik mumbled, moving the pot of incense himself, making sure it lined up neatly on the chalk drawing on the kitchen tiles, "lastly… we need a sacrificed calf,"
"Got it," Bakura stood up and walked towards the fridge before bringing out a rather large cut of sirloin steak.
Malik stared dumbfounded at the plate then at Bakura, "Really?"
"…Well where else do you propose I find a freshly killed baby cow in the middle of Domino City?"
"I was going to cook that…" Malik begun to continue his protest but shook his head and disregarded it, waving for Bakura to settle it down in the middle of the ring, "fine, fine, it will do,"
"So what's the drill if this all goes horribly wrong?"
"It's not going to go 'horribly wrong'," Malik's voice went up a pitch or two mimicking Bakura on the last two words, before unfolding the second piece of paper and placing it on the floor and lining it up with the first.
"Ok, so I think we should read Ishizu's chant first, followed by the incantation, that way it should relax my mind and soul, and you can use this to banish whatever remains—"
"So now I'm the one doing the voodoo?" Bakura cocked a disapproving eyebrow.
"For gods sake you're a spirit who depends on shadow magic to even exist. You wear the cursed emblem of the pharaoh around your neck, stop being a baby about a bit of voodoo!"
"…What did you just call my ring?"
"Oh, shut up!"
In truth, Bakura was merely picking fun. Malik's nerves were riled beyond belief and Bakura couldn't help but poke him, like a curious child and an injured tiger, he wanted to see how far he could push. Which was stupid, he knew, considering what lay beneath the vault of Malik's anger, but still, he couldn't resist the fiery look Malik got in his eyes when he was all hot and bothered…
Before Bakura was even aware of it, Malik had begun chanting the first part, speaking in ancient Egyptian, as fluently as one would expect a native speaker of the dead language. It was short lived, and nothing much happened, except Malik gave Bakura a pointed look to start reading his part of the chant, which he did without hesitation. His part of the chant came a little more stiffly, the words not a language that came naturally to either of them, but soon he had forced out every peculiar word, and they sat in silence awaiting any obvious effect.
And there was none.
The candles continued to burn, Malik continued to stare ahead expectantly and the steak stayed in the middle of the chalk-lined ring, looking very tasty to Bakura. In fact the only obvious difference in the small kitchen was that it had begun to smell very nice due to the various pots of incense…
They waited quite some time, Malik had even taken to closing his eyes and holding his hands open on his lap in a vein attempt to provoke any sort of magic to take its toll on him but—
"This. Is. Bullshit."
Suddenly the blond leapt up, kicking over a pot of incense in his sudden movement, and smearing a large part of the ring. He then proceeded to walk out of the small kitchenette, through the living room, and stormed into his room, slamming the door behind him.
Bakura shuffled, his shins feeling numb from sitting on the tiled floor for so long.
"Malik!" he called out and there was a muffled cry behind the bedroom door.
"What?!"
"Can I eat the steak?" to which the blond begun throwing things against his bedroom door. The spirit flinched, reaching forward and picking up the steak and moving it to the counter. It was more than obvious it was never going to work, but he thought he might as well humour him.
He got out two plates, deciding for once he could force himself to cook a meal, (and for a steak this big he was quite happy to oblige). He begun to cut up the large slab of meat into two chunks, listening to Malik's constant tantrum beyond the walls, when there was a sudden dull thump followed by silence.
Bakura looked up, briefly wondering if he should check on the blond… but at the same time he didn't fancy being attacked by flailing pieces of bedroom furniture. He waited a moment longer and the silence continued, growing all the time filling Bakura's gut with a tedious foreboding feeling.
With a disgruntled sigh he left his dear steak alone and walked to Malik's bedroom, knocking on the door once, before it was flung open and two tanned hands wrapped around his neck, forcing him back until he collided roughly with the adjacent wall.
He managed to regain his senses enough to noticed two wild purple eyes staring at him from a twisted, grinning face, before he was hurled down to the floor, face first.
He pushed himself up with his forearms, choking to get his breath back, just as he felt those same hands were now grabbing his ankles and dragging him across the carpeted floor.
He clawed at the ground, trying to gain back some form of control, furious that he had been taken off guard so easily and now was being helplessly dragged along. He kicked out frantically but the other was simply stronger than him, and once again he found himself cursing this meek, pale, body in which he was forced to reside.
Eventually he was dropped down, onto the tiled floor of the kitchen, right in the middle of the now vastly smeared chalk ring.
He wasted no time in turning himself onto his back, preparing himself to jump up and attack his assailant but before he could a large foot slammed down on his chest, causing the breath to wheeze out of him.
"Good evening, thief," the sneering face was brought closer when the towering figure chose to lean forward, and Bakura once again found himself face to face with the shadow of Malik's mind.
"You bastard—" he gasped out, hands suddenly darting forward to grab the foot that was crushing his chest and attempting to force it off, which it did, all too easily, because before Bakura knew it the shadow was willingly moving down, to straddle him.
"Marik," a large tanned hand grabbed the front of Bakura's head before pulling it up and slamming it against the tiled floor, "my name is Marik."
The world grew hazy, Bakura's vision feeling like it was literally being knocked out of focus. He groaned, feeding off his anger to try and find and use whatever mere strength this damn body had.
"And I'm not going anywhere, no silly ritual is going to change that," Malik's shadow sneered, his hand running down from Bakura's forehead and cupping the side of his face, "I quite like it here, with a personal punching bag," the hand that hadn't been grasping Bakura's head suddenly punched him harshly in the stomach, "a thoroughly entertaining mind to reside in," he tapped the side of his head, "and… not to mention, the company," with that he leaned down the rest of the way, until his lips were literally brushing against Bakura's, his hand coming up to pull loose the thread of the millennium ring, "Right, Ryou?"
But before he could Bakura's hand had darted sideways, grabbing the first thing he could, which happened to be one of the incense jars, and then brought it smashing against the side of the shadow's face, causing the Egyptian to curse, and giving Bakura enough time and leverage to shove him off and scuttle back across the room, then jump up, grabbing the steak knife he had been using prior to the attack, and pointed it down at the blond, who was cradling his now bleeding head.
Bakura spared no time in moving again, while the blond was distracted. He moved over lightening quick, grabbed the back of his collar and pressed the knife against the tan skin of the other's neck.
The shadow merely chuckled in response, "as if you'd really slit his throat..."
"For the sake of ridding myself of you, it's painfully tempting," Bakura growled, pressing the knife closer into his neck and this time actually earning a gurgled noise of protest, however, the blond continued on.
"You don't have the guts," he laughed, although it sounded strained due to the knife pressed up against his gullet.
"I've killed hundreds before what makes you think you're even the slightest bit different?" Bakura growled impatiently.
"Beeecauuussseee it's not just me in here," he tilted his head side to side, consequentially causing the blade to slice into his neck, "like it or not Malik staying here has proven quite helpful. Besides the copious amount of flaws in all your master plans it is nice to know you're also prone to self sabotage,"
Bakura let out a low and dangerous noise before raising his foot up and kicking the blond to the floor, face first. The Egyptian begun to cackle, the blood from his head down smeared down his face. He whipped around to stare up at the thief, his shoulder's quaking with his continued laughter.
"Caring about someone, anyone! Is a weakness, you have too much pride for yourself, too much protection for your host and not to mention what ever complicated relationship you seem to be forming with the lesser side of my mind!"
Bakura snorted in disbelief, "all inaccurate observations. You couldn't be further from the truth,"
"Oh? Is that so-o..." he paused for a moment, looked shocked before another low, but more restrained, chuckle escaped him, "looks like my time is up... Have fun tending to the w-o-ounds..." With that purple eyes rolled back, until Bakura could only see the whites of Malik's eyes. His whole body shuddered before deflating and falling face first onto the tiled floor, with a sickening crack.
Bakura threw the knife aside before kneeling down and pulling Malik up onto his lap. The cuts from the incense pot on the side of his head were the worst; his nose was possibly bruised but not broken from the collision with the floor, and the cut on his throat had broke the skin but it wasn't even bleeding profusely. He gave a relieved sigh before trying to bundle the blond into his arms. It took him a while, and he struggled a great deal, but eventually he managed to get the unconscious boy from the kitchen into the lounge, and once again Bakura found reason to be frustrated with the limited capability of his current body.
He regarded Malik's still form and despite himself felt a well of anxiety rising up, unsure with how far Malik's injuries went considering he still had not woken, and with frustration the thief realised he didn't even know where his host kept the first aid kit, normally when their vessel was hurt or injured he left it up to Ryou...
'Landlord,' he suddenly activated their mind link 'I need your help'
oooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo
A/N mixing magic is bad, m'kay?
Also 99% of this was written on public transportation. Yes.